Need help picking park days

[andy_dangg]

Hi all,

In August we'll be staying at Wilderness Lodge and doing a trip visiting all four parks. This is our current plan:

Sunday: check in and Epcot
Monday: DHS
Tuesday: resort day
Wednesday: Magic Kingdom
Thursday: check out and Animal Kingdom

I'm happy with the placement of our Epcot and Magic Kingdom days; Epcot is open the latest which is great for our arrival day, and we want to spend our anniversary in Magic Kingdom.

However I'm considering switching our Animal Kingdom and DHS days. We're driving to WDW, so we'll have a car. I thought that Animal Kingdom would be good for a check out day because there's the least to do, but I really enjoy time at the resort, so moving it to Monday will allow us to spend more time at the resort--I'm thinking we'll be done at AK by 2-3. This would also allow us to have a later start on our departure day, so we have more time to pack up before going to the park.

My main concern though is transportation to DHS. If we go on our departure day, we'd likely drive to the park. However I've seen some really awful car lines to get into DHS which has me concerned we'd be stuck in a car line and not be in the park by 10 for a boarding group. We stayed at Boardwalk last month and were spoiled with the proximity to DHS, but for this trip I'm concerned that we'd be stuck relying on Disney transportation or trapped in a long line of cars.

So, would y'all recommend doing Animal Kingdom or DHS on our departure day? I'd hate to have to rush out of the hotel to get to AK in the morning, but I guess I'd rather do that instead of possibly missing the BG drop. Also, what transportation method do you recommend for DHS, bus or driving?

 

[Obliviate]

I personally wouldn't do HS on departure day if that's your only day at the park and you intend to do RotR. Unless you don't mind leaving late that is. I'll be at the parks in a few days and I'm tentatively planning on doing AK on my departure day.

 

[andy_dangg]

I personally wouldn't do HS on departure day if that's your only day at the park and you intend to do RotR. Unless you don't mind leaving late that is. I'll be at the parks in a few days and I'm tentatively planning on doing AK on my departure day.

We live about a 2 hour drive away from the park and I wouldn't mind leaving late, but I feel like I would be stressed about NEEDING to arrive at opening on checkout day.

 

[Spazz2k]

I would keep AK as departure date....we did AK a couple of Sundays ago and we arrived at 10:45 and we were done by 3:00 that day...no lines, walk right on everything. It is a very relaxed park compared to DHS...so good thing about going to DHS on Monday is you can go back to the resort to chill out and cool off and then go back to the park. We stayed at Wilderness a couple of weeks ago and we left at 8:50 to get to DHS via car and had no issues...we were in the park by 9:40. I think if driving to DHS from the lodge, it is perfect timing to leave at 8:50 by car.